Being told to take a look on Adobe's forums, I decided to see what was going on. Apparently, someone opened a scanned image of currency as a TIFF for a client, and PS CS refused to open it. Here's the beginning post:

We received a TIFF image from a customer, of a $20 bill. The image does
*not* violate any laws regarding reproduction of currency (it's not even
close to actual-size, and it's not a "flat" portrayal - it's wavy, as if
it's fluttering in the wind. Nor is it real-color.

However, Photoshop CS refuses to open the image, and provides an error
message regarding the (il)legality of currency reproduction and an
"information" button that takes you to the web. (Photoshop 7, of course,
has no such qualms).

What the hell is this? In my book this is completely unacceptable -
Photoshop is an image editor, not a censor, government policy enforcer
or anything else.

Adobe revealed it added the technology after a customer complained in an online support forum about mysterious behavior by the new $649 "Photoshop CS" software when opening an image of a U.S. $20 bill.

Kevin Connor, Adobe's product management director, said the company did not disclose the technology in Photoshop's instructions at the request of international bankers. He said Adobe is looking at adding the detection mechanism to its other products.

"The average consumer is never going to encounter this in their daily use," Mr. Connor said. "It just didn't seem like something meaningful to communicate."

Angry customers have flooded Adobe's Internet message boards with complaints about censorship and concerns over future restrictions on other types of images, such as copyrighted or adult material.

"I don't believe this. This shocks me," said Stephen M. Burns, president of the Photoshop users group in San Diego. "Artists don't like to be limited in what they can do with their tools. Let the U.S. government or whoever is involved deal with this, but don't take the powers of the government and place them into a commercial software package."

Mr. Connor said the company's decision to use the technology was "not a step down the road towards Adobe becoming Big Brother."

Adobe said the technology slows its software's performance "just a fraction of a second" and urged customers to report unexpected glitches. It said the technology was new and there may be room for improvement.

The technology was designed recently by the Central Bank Counterfeit Deterrence Group, a consortium of 27 central banks in the United States, England, Japan, Canada and across the European Union, where there already is a formal proposal to require all software companies to include similar anti-counterfeit technology

I can understand having that technology, as printers and whatnot have gotten to the point of doing such good reproduction. But come on, Adobe was fricken stupid not to notify the world about it. That is one of those things that, had they put out press releases and SHOUTED it was there, people probably would have been a bit miffed and said they didn't like it, but still buy the program. Then when they encounter an image that causes that error, instead of being shocked and taken completely by surprise, they probably would have chuckled and said, "gee, it really works. Now how do I get around it?".

They did the same thing with the online activation of CS. Right up until I installed CS, I didn't know it was going to require this. I had heard rumours, but nothing solid, and being that I ordered it from Adobe before it was available, there wasn't a lot of other people using it / sharing info. I was pretty pissed when it asked me to activate it, not because I am going to send it to everyone I know, just because it is a stupid, sneaky little thing to do. I wouldn't have been so angry if I had known ahead of time.

And on top of all that, when the hell are they going to let you change the brush indicators' color when you go over an area that is the same color as the brush indicator!!!!??!?!?!?!?!?!??!?!!?!?!?!?!??! ;)

Yeah, I think if Adobe would have just said they had anti-counterfeiting software included in PS CS, and it was only applicable to certain kinds of currency, I wouldn't have been so surprised either. Bad move on their part.